Environmental/Ecological Thrillers

[Charles]

Since everyone is concerned about our environment and global warming, a new subgenre in thrillers has surfaced. It’s been called environmental, enviro or eco thrillers. Michael Crichton’s “State of Fear” might fit into this category. However the recently released action filled thriller, Green Power, by Charles Vrooman truly belongs to this new subgenre. Going green and bioterrorism are at odds with each other in this novel. See synopsis below and give your input as to whether you feel this novel fits into this category. Also, what other thrillers do you feel can be classified as environmental thrillers?
Synopsis:
After the renowned Microbiologist Dr. Ray Pendleton leads a demonstration to close down Rancho Seco Nuclear Power Plant, Ray is assaulted by two of Dirk Hendrickson’s fellow Delta Valley Militiamen. Ray survives the beating and is motivated to set up Methane Digesters as an alternative source of electrical power for Lodi dairies.
Dirk’s continued attacks on the professor and his projects results in a death threatening epidemic pointing to one of Ray’s methane lagoons as the cause. The infected patients are admitted to UC Davis Medical Center. Linda McCord, a lab tech at the hospital and former student of Dr. Pendleton, works with Ray to prove that the methane power source is not the cause of this spreading disease. Both Ray and Linda develop a romantic relationship while working together. Linda is devastated when Ray develops a serious infection from the bacterium causing the epidemic.
Note: Few writers’ signed copies of the environmental/medical thriller novel, Green Power, still available on amazon.com from GP_AUTHOR. For information on author and book, go to: http://www.freewebs.com/vrooman

[Sam]

Hey Charles, I think I'd agree that it would come under the eco thrillers banner from the sounds of it. I've recently read one book called Black Tide by Caroline Carver which follows an Australian journalist who survives the sinking of a Greenpeace ship in the Antarctic Sea and during her investigations into who's responsible she uncovers an extensive mafia style ring of corruption involving a large Australian family and their involvement in illegal waste dumping and inproper use of chemicals in their new 'eco-friendly' refrigerators. It's a good fast paced story with good environmental undertones.

I'll have to keep a look out for Green Power. Good discussion idea :-)

[M]

Welcome Charles ! I have read all the topics from your website www.freewebs.com. and particularly the " Green Power's links" (synopsis, prologue and chapters) . I agree with you and Sam that "Green Power" fits into the category of Eco-Thriller and specially the subgenre Medical Thriller.

Eco Thrillers are popular because they dramatically effect the World we live in.
These novels highlight real-life environmental issues, the man's interference with the natural world is often the source of the problem.
"Medical Thriller", "Disaster Thriller", "Futuristic Eco-Thriller" all these subgenres could be classified "Environmental/ Eco Thrillers".

I have recently read an Environmental/ Eco book.
Freezing Point by Karen Dionne, features a concerned environmentalist who thinks he can alleviate the world's desperate need to pure, fresh water by melting Antarctic icebergs into drinking water. Instead, his lack of understanding of the polar environment, coupled with corporate greed, creates an even bigger problem that ultimately threatens the entire planet.

Environmental/ Eco thrillers are one of the different genres of novels that we could read about Environmental Issues, Climate Crisis and Global Warming effects. I try to propose, at "The Green group" books's list, the most ecclectic and relevant choice about these subjects.

You wrote " Since everyone is concerned about our Environment and Global Warming"...... .
I recently read a report by "The American Psychological Association" which argue that people do not see Climate change as an immediate taking action.

Here's an article from the magazine online "The Ecologist " about this subject
12 th August, 2009

" The Psychology of Climate Change: Why We Do Nothing"

http://www.theecologist.org/News/news...


We are all concerned, I agree. But how we take action.......
A good discussion idea :-)

Agree with you, Sam :-) Green Power, a good discussion idea, too.

Sam, Grégoire. Do you think that we could organize a debate about " Energy" ?
How could we organize it ? Do you think that It will be relevant to create a topic "Energy" at the thread "Members Q&A" or a special, new folder to discuss with a link " Q&A Energy " for members and moderators?

[Grégoire]

A new form of cyberpunk is called biopunk, where machines are replaced by nanolifeforms, viruses and things like that. I think much science-fiction is using nature and ecology as a startpoint to create universes (overpopulation, global warming, malthusianist theories, etc)...

I bought Le parfum d'Adam this week, it seems cool - but appears in french only here...

[M]

Grégoire wrote: "A new form of cyberpunk is called biopunk, where machines are replaced by nanolifeforms, viruses and things like that. I think much science-fiction is using nature and ecology as a startpoint to cr..."

Thank you for posting "Jean-Christophe Ruffin's" new book. I just added it to my shelves. I have read some critics and comments of his new novel Le parfum d'Adam. His novel is an Environmental/ Eco-Thriller, subgenre " Futuristic Eco-Thriller ". Environmental/ Eco-Thriller are surfaced in Europe and France, too.

[M]

Freezing Point

Salvation and annihilation meet at one degree.One man's dream of providing clean drinking water for millions, tapped from the polar ice, sparks a conflict of humanity, science, big business, and environmental extremism.But no one can foresee the true danger hidden deep within the ice- an enemy more deadly than any could imagine, and an apocalyptic horror mankind may not survive."

*******************************

Green Power

http://www.freewebs.com/vrooman/

[Sam]

I think Michael Crichton's Prey could also come under this banner. It's about a lab in America that has developed artificial intelligence in the form of nano particles that begin hunting the people at the lab. It's very good and when you sit and think about it properly its really quite scary as you can imagine it actually happening at some point in the future.

[[deleted user]]

Sam wrote: "I think Michael Crichton's Prey could also come under this banner. It's about a lab in America that has developed artificial intelligence in the form of nano particles that begin hunt..."

I've read this a couple of times, and enjoyed it. It raises some issues about computer modeling and AI that are quite provocative ...

[Charles]

I've also read Michael Crichton's novel, Prey, and enjoyed it. As a matter of fact, the thriller novel I'm working on now is about nano computers. At present, it's title is "The True Virus".

[Sam]

You'll have to let us know when you've finished that Charles so we can have a look out for it :-)

[Grégoire]

I finished Rufin's book. Here are some lines of what he wrote as a postface (bad translation, sorry :)

Malthus isn't dead, he saw epidemics and starving as a “natural” mecanism to regulate population and, reducing it, to adapt it to “subsistance”, to its available resources.
The influence of this perspective […:] also reaches other contemporary ideologies and, in the first place, some branches of ecology. The quotes in this book are all exact, including the most incredible, like the one from William Aiken: “A massive human mortality would be a good thing. It's our duty to provoke it. It's our duty as a species, in relation to our environment, to reduce 90% of our population.” (Earthbound: Essays in Environmental Ethics).
For French readers, this kind of declaration can only come from an extremist minority. Ecology, in our country, gets the sympathy of many truthful people who do not share such ideas. Here, ecology has the nice face of political movements open to the public, living simple and inoffensive battle when they get an inch of power – to promote bicycling and recycling. Even the spectaclar actions from Greenpeace ou GMO crops harvesters are seen as an inoffensive mise em scène. So, we forget the form it can take in other countries, like the United States and England. Ecoterrorism is a very serious matter for security services in these countries. The FBI even considered ecoterrorism as the second threat against the US, just after islamic fundamentalism. This opinion is still debated. Nonetheless, the existence of a violent ecology cannot be contested.
It is based on a theoretical reflexion largely ignored in France. This radical critic of man is another aspect of the renewal of contemporary malthusian thinking. For the deep ecology, “Man isn't at the top of the hierarchy of life. On the contrary, it lies inside the ecosphere as a part the the whole.” Practical consequences of this theory point to “humanitarian” matters about population. Among the famous “Eight thesis on deep ecology” by the Norwegian thinker Arne Naess, we can find that: “The flourishing of cultures and of human life is compatible with a substancial reduction of human population”.

[M]

Sam wrote: "I think Michael Crichton's Prey could also come under this banner. It's about a lab in America that has developed artificial intelligence in the form of nano particles that begin hunt..."

Thanks for Michael Crichton book's recommendation, Sam. I'll try to read it during our Winter's book club. Looks interesting:-)

[Shultonus]

A couple of reccommendations

Kim Stanley Robinson's
60 days and Counting
50 degrees below Zero
and 40 Signs of Rain
brillant,.. about rapid climate shift

Also Plague Year and Plague War
by Jeff Carson
Nano-bot virus

Michael Criton's Next
about intelligence enhanced animals

Kim Stanley Robinson also
has a series on terraforming Mars
Red Mars, Blue Mars and Green Mars

While not fiction
James Howardd Kunstler's Long Emergency might be of interest.

Also not fiction
Farley Mowat's
No Man's River,
Lost in the Barrens
and People of the Deer.

Some of the best reads for thrillers were

And Into the Wild
and Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer
Although again non-fiction.

[M]

Thanks for all your recommendations. I have read your books' classification per genres - fiction, non-fiction, thrillers. Some books are classified in the genres we all knew like " Sci-Fi ", " Fantasy ", " Fiction ", " Non -Fiction " ," Thrillers ". We find sometimes, in these genres, innovative, provocative plots with topics about environmental issues, climate crisis like James Howard Kunslter's book The Long Emergency: Surviving the End of Oil, Climate Change, and Other Converging Catastrophes of the Twenty-First Century global warming effects, nanotechnologies like Jeff Carson's Trilogy -" The Plague Year " or nature like your recommendations about Farley Mowat's No Man's River, Lost in the Barrens , and People of the Deer which tells great adventures in nature and the encounter with different cultures.

Kim Stanley Robinson's books tells some issues with environmental topics but his writings are initially classified in Sci-Fi with a lot of novels awarded.

And finally, John Krauker's story. Into the Wild man's role in nature which is one of the theme of this novel, the second one is the concept of materialism. The subject of the book, Chris McCandless, believes that man's ultimate joy can only be found in communion with nature.

[J.L.]

I think this genre is absolutely awesome! It is entertaining yet informative a lot of times, combining two great worlds.
In my book (sorry if it sounds like I am self-promoting) I really tried to tie in a lot of ecological factors into it as well as political. I think it is going to be a huge uprising trend in newer releases since it is such a daily part of our lives and we are going to see a lot more of it.